#67 The Canadian Grappling Scene, Royce Gracie, Carlos Valente

At The FightWorks Podcast, we understand that the sport we love, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and submission grappling, is a global phenomena. We have a pretty good connection with our neighbors in Europe thanks to Jude Samuel. In this episode of The FightWorks Podcast we turn our eyes northward to our neighbors in Canada, who have also embraced grappling and mixed martial arts the way we have in the USA.

Our featured guest is Riccardo Ammendolia, also known as “Baleia” (meaning “whale”). Riccardo is a brown belt in BJJ, organizes grappling tourneys in his native province of Ontario, and often writes about Canadian grappling for OnTheMat.com. We’ll discuss what’s hot up north, who’s tearing up the scene, what obstacles the sport faces, and more.

I’ll also play part of a conference call held this week in preparation for the Dynamite!! card to be held June 2, presented by FEG (Fighting Entertainment Group), ProElite and SHOWTIME Networks. The event will feature fights with Jake Shields, Brock Lesnar, Gina Carano, and South Korean Hong Man Choi. Headlining the event will be a rematch of the legendary fight between Royce Gracie and Kazushi Sakuraba. In the conference call, Royce Gracie was available for questions and I’ve excerpted the ones I asked him.

Black belt corner: Carlos “The Professor” Valente

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